Rapunzel (Fairytale)
"Rapunzel" is a fairytale featured on ABC's Once Upon a Time. It was written by the German authors Jacob and Wilhelm of the Brothers Grimm and incorporated into the book "Grimms' Fairy Tales" in 1812. Traditional Plot An impoverished couple longing to have children lives near a fearsome witch whose house has an enormous garden. After becoming pregnant, the wife starts craving the rapunzel plant growing in the Witch's garden and asks her husband to break into the garden and steal some for her. The husband does so and makes a salad out of the plant, which she devours. When the wife asks for more the following day, the husband goes back to the garden and retrieves more of the plant only to be caught by the Witch, who demands his life as payment. Upon learning about his wife's cravings, however, the Witch promises to let the husband live on the condition that he surrender the child as soon as it is born. The husband agrees to her terms and returns home with his life. Sometime later, after the wife gives birth to a baby girl, the Witch appears and takes the infant, whom she names Rapunzel, to raise as her own. Time passes and Rapunzel grows into a beautiful young woman with long golden hair. When she reaches the age of twelve, the Witch locks her in a secluded tower with only one window and no doors. Whenever the Witch pays a visit, Rapunzel wraps her hair around a hook and lets it down so the Witch can enter. Several years later, while riding through the forest, a Prince comes across the tower after hearing Rapunzel sing. Unable to enter, he returns to the tower several times to hear her voice. One day, after seeing the Witch climb the tower, the Prince waits until she has left and asks Rapunzel to let her hair down. Despite her initial hesitation, Rapunzel becomes better acquainted with the Prince, who comes to visit her every day. During one visit, the Prince proposes to Rapunzel and she accepts. The two then plan to escape the tower by making a ladder out of silk. Before they can do so, Rapunzel accidentally gives away the Prince to the Witch, who responds by cutting off her hair and casting her out to fend for herself. When the Prince returns to the tower that same night, the Witch tricks him into climbing up Rapunzel's severed hair before pushing him off the tower and into a thick bramble. Blinded by the thorns, the Prince wanders through the wilderness for several months, not knowing that Rapunzel now lives there with her fraternal twins. One day, the Prince hears Rapunzel singing and reunites with her. They wrap one another in a jubilant embrace, with her tears restoring his sight, before taking the twins to the Prince's kingdom. Show Adaptation First Iteration= First Iteration *Rapunzel was forced up the Tower by the Witch, who is actually a manifestation of her greatest fear. **Said manifestation took on a physical form immediately after Rapunzel consumed a plant rumored to rid the user of any fear. *The Prince is already married to Snow White by the time he meets Rapunzel and shows no romantic interest in her. |-| Second Iteration= Second Iteration *The Witch locks Rapunzel in the Tower after promising to help save her husband and two daughters. **Rapunzel escapes and later tricks the Witch into imprisoning herself. The latter then uses magic to turn herself as Rapunzel and, after residing in the Tower for several years, deceives the Prince into conceiving a child with her before leaving the infant to take her place. Characters Featured Location Featured Items Featured References Category:Stories